Father
by artemis-nz
Summary: She wonders what would happen if she were to call Commander Ikari 'Father'. Rei-centric.


Her name is Rei Ayanami.

Rei.

She tells herself this, over and over. When she is alone she says it out loud, a mantra that will, she feels illogically, hold her very body together. This makes no sense. The cold, observant part of her tells her that a body is made of fat, muscle, tissue, sinew, tendon, bone. A body is solid, therefore it cannot simply fall apart without extreme stress being placed upon it. Yet as she lies with both arms folded in front of her, she is aware of how fragile her heartbeat feels.

She repeats her name so that she can stay together, one body, one form. An individual. There is no other Rei Ayanami. She is the only herself, there is nobody else who can claim that she is not herself.

She sleeps after that ritual. She sleeps because she is aware that the human body she inhabits cannot last without sleep. This involves closing the eyes, breathing deeply and evenly, voluntarily relaxing her body, calming her mind and focusing only on what the body needs to survive. Sleep. She sleeps.

Sometimes she even dreams. She understands that if anybody were to watch her, they would see her eyelids flicker. They would perhaps see her fingers twitch, and perhaps hear soft sounds from her mouth that the dreams induce. They would understand that her mind is merely processing all that has happened during the day, and ordering it and sorting it while her body rests.

She is nonetheless often disturbed at these dreams. She knows that dreaming is necessary, but cannot understand why so many faces appear in this fantasy world. She does not comprehend why people are shown to her when she has no interest in what they say, what they do, what they look like, what they might feels, what they love and what they hate, their past or their future or even their present. She is herself, and does not care about others. They must look after themselves, and she is preoccupied with what she must do. Everyone has a reason to exist; she has hers, and that must be all that matters. She will look after her body in order to carry out that reason, but other than this she has no alterior purpose.

Shinji looks at her in her dreams, and calls her Mother. He wants to touch her, but she pulls away, and does not allow the contact. Why she feels it is important that he does not touch her, she cannot say.

Asuka looks at her in her dreams, and yells at her some more. She calls her Doll and Whore and other names that Rei does not remember when she wakes. Rei does not let this bother her unduly.

A boy with grey hair and red eyes looks at her in her dreams, and she is unaccountably afraid. Fear is something she should not feel - in her dreams least of all. Yet fear him she does, and she wakes up and banishes him from her mind as quickly as possible.

There are other faces - her own, yet not her own. They have her face and yet the faces are alien to her. This fears her most of all - perhaps because there are so many of them, and because although they are all her, she does not recognise them. She does not know what they are, and worst of all they do not know either.

Rei awakens lightly sweating. Her eyes adjust rapidly to the light. The floor is cold beneath bare feet as she pads to the door where the light switch is. She does not open the curtains. It is raining outside in any case; she can hear the sound like it is a part of her. Vehicles go past on the road, a child crosses the street, a horn sounds, the rain continues. It is all a pattern, and one that anybody could work out if they only listened.

Rei has no reason to feel sad, but she does. Sadness is only an emotion, she tells herself. And emotion is simply electric signals that are sent to the brain in order to produce a mental response.

She lies back down on the bed after she finishes dressing. She has slept, but does not feel quite rested or fully awake yet. This feeling she is also used to.

That knowledge does not stop her from folding her arms in front of her once more, and the thought steals into her mind that shouldn't be there. She doesn't understand.

She wonders what would happen if she called Commander Ikari Father.

Her name is Rei Ayanami.

She gets up, opens the door and goes to school.


End file.
